The Sacrifice

1986 / France-Sweden / 145m / Col / Psychological Drama, Religious DramaErland Josephson, Susan Fleetwood, Valerie Mairesse, Allan Edwall, Guorun Gisladottir, Sven Wollter, Filippa Franzen, Tommy Kjellqvist, Per Kallman, Tommy Nordahl"Andrei Tarkovsky's final film from 1986 looks to me quite different twenty years on. It is brilliant and audacious, with one of the most extraordinary final sequences in modern cinema, and all in a manner which Hollywood in the succeeding decade would learn to call "high concept". But it is more complex and ambiguous than it appeared at the time: its tragic meaning has darkened and clotted with time… Tarkovsky died the year of its release; Susan Fleetwood died of cancer died nine years later, thus robbing us of one of the great actresses of her generation." - Peter Bradshaw, The GuardianSelected by Pere Portabella, Julio Medem, Alan Pauls, Antonio Delgado, Ian Wild.

Salesman

1969 / USA / 85m / BW / Culture & Society, DocumentaryPaul Brennan, Charles McDevitt, James Baker, Raymond Martos, Melbourne I. Feltman, Margaret McCarron, Kennie Turner"A landmark American documentary, Salesman captures in vivid detail the bygone era of the door-to-door salesman. While laboring to sell a gold-embossed version of the Good Book, Paul Brennan and his colleagues target the beleaguered masses—then face the demands of quotas and the frustrations of life on the road. Following Brennan on his daily rounds, the Maysles discover a real-life Willy Loman, walking the line from hype to despair." - The Criterion CollectionSelected by Heather Hendershot, J.M. Tyree, Mike Maggiore, Bart Weiss, Ethan Coen.

Salò, or the 120 Days of Sodom

1975 / Italy / 117m / Col / Drama, Sex HorrorPaolo Bonacelli, Giorgio Cataldi, Umberto Paolo Quintavalle, Aldo Valletti, Caterina Boratto, Helene Surgere, Sonia Saviange, Elsa De Giorgi, Ines Pellegrini, Rinaldo Missaglia"The notorious final film from Pier Paolo Pasolini, Salò, or The 120 Days of Sodom has been called nauseating, shocking, depraved, pornographic... It’s also a masterpiece. The controversial poet, novelist, and filmmaker’s transposition of the Marquis de Sade’s eighteenth-century opus of torture and degradation to Fascist Italy in 1944 remains one of the most passionately debated films of all time, a thought-provoking inquiry into the political, social, and sexual dynamics that define the world we live in." - The Criterion CollectionSelected by Amos Gitai, Gaspar Noé, Michael Haneke, Sergei Loznitsa, Bertrand Bonello.

Le Samouraï

1967 / France / 95m / Col / Crime Thriller, Post-Noir (Modern Noir)Alain Delon, Nathalie Delon, Francois Perier, Caty Rosier, Jacques Leroy, Jean-Pierre Posier, Catherine Jourdan, Michel Boisrond, Robert Favart, Roger Fradet"Melville's hombres don't talk a lot, they just move in and out of the shadows, their trenchcoats lined with guilt and their hats hiding their eyes. This is a great movie, an austere masterpiece, with Delon as a cold, enigmatic contract killer who lives by a personal code of bushido. Essentially, the plot is about an alibi, yet Melville turns this into a mythical revenge story, with Cathy Rosier as Delon's black, piano-playing nemesis who might just as easily have stepped from the pages of Cocteau or Sophocles as Vogue. Similarly, if Delon is Death, Périer's cop is a date with Destiny." - Adrian Turner, Time OutSelected by Ginette Vincendeau, Klaus Kreimeier, John Michael McDonagh, Mike Hodges, Monte Hellman.See also 1,000 Noir Films.

Le Sang des bêtes

1949 / France / 20m / BW / Culture & Society, DocumentaryGeorges Hubert, Nicole Ladmiral"Despite the grim content, this description of three abbatoirs is no vegetarian tract. What most fascinates Franju is the inflicting of violent death as a matter of banal 9-to-5 routine. We soon pick up the process: the pickaxe through the skull, the throatcutting, the steaming blood (it's winter) spilling across the stone floor, the hacking and dismembering… The slaughterhouses are placed in geographical context, with Kosma's lilting waltz theme accompanying an evocation of the outskirts of post-war Paris: canals, junk markets, scrubby wasteland. It's a gift of a subject for a surrealist like Franju: an everyday nightmare, at once atrocious and outlandishly beautiful." - Bob Baker, Time OutSelected by Daniel Kasman, Paula Arantzazu Ruiz, Robert Gardner, Tom Vincent, Patrick Keiller.

Sans soleil

1983 / France / 100m / Col / Avant-garde-Experimental, DocumentaryFlorence Delay, Arielle Dombasle"Chris Marker's masterpiece is one of the key nonfiction films of our time—a personal philosophical essay that concentrates mainly on contemporary Tokyo but also includes footage shot in Iceland, Guinea-Bissau, and San Francisco. Difficult to describe and almost impossible to summarize, this poetic journal of a major French filmmaker radiates in all directions, exploring and reflecting upon many decades of experience… A film about subjectivity, death, photography, social custom, and consciousness itself, Sans Soleil registers like a poem one might find in a time capsule." - Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago ReaderSelected by Abé Mark Nornes, Adam Nayman, Adrian Danks, Andrew Kotting, Götz Spielmann.

Sansho the Bailiff

1954 / Japan / 125m / BW / Drama, Period FilmKinuyo Tanaka, Yoshiaki Hanayagi, Kyoko Kagawa, Eitaro Shindo, Akitake Kono, Masao Shimizu, Ken Mitsuda, Kazukimi Okuni, Yoko Kosono, Noriko Tachibana"Mizoguchi develops his medieval fable about moral freedom and slavery with intuition, cunning, and an overarching sense of tragedy; as it uncoils, this masterwork spirals and expands to encompass all the tricks of history and fate, all the failures of ethics and character that can defeat the best intentions of idealists... Mizoguchi’s packed compositions express the harrowing pull of the narrative line—and the residual humanity that tugs against it. Every positive action in this movie has an opposite reaction, leaving an increment of glory in defeat… Terrifying and cathartic, Sansho the Bailiff is a morality play without easy moralism." - Michael Sragow, The Criterion CollectionSelected by Armond White, Carlos Reygadas, Dave Kehr, Charles Barr, Gilberto Perez.

Sátántangó

1994 / Hungary-Germany-Switzerland / 450m / BW / Drama, Ensemble FilmMihaly Vig, Putyi Horvath, Laszlo feLugossy, Eva Almassy Albert, Janos Derzsi, Iren Szajki, Alfred Jarai, Miklos Szekely B., Erzsebet Gaal, Erika Bok"Most simply described, Tarr's masterpiece—adapted from a much esteemed, if still untranslated, novel by László Krasznahorkai—is a bleakly comic allegory of social disintegration on the muddy puszta. Set on an entropic collective farm during the last years of Hungarian Communism, it's a mordant, characteristically Eastern European tale of hapless peasants and charismatic swindlers. With fewer shots than the average 90-minute feature, Sátántangó is a double tour de force—for the actors, as the camera circles them in lengthy continuous takes, and for Tarr, who constructs his narrative out of these morose blocks of real time." - J. Hoberman, The Village VoiceSelected by Zhao Liang, Jonathan Romney, Jonathan Rosenbaum, Ronald Bergan, Ying Liang.

Saturday Night and Sunday Morning

1960 / UK / 89m / BW / Drama, Urban DramaAlbert Finney, Shirley Anne Field, Rachel Roberts, Hylda Baker, Norman Rossington, Bryan Pringle, Robert Cawdron, Edna Morris, Elsie Wagstaff, Frank Pettitt"While it was hardly the first of the British "Angry Young Man" dramas of the late 1950s/early 1960s (Look Back In Anger beat it to the screen by nearly two years), Saturday Night and Sunday Morning was one of the best, thanks largely to a superb performance by Albert Finney in his first leading film role. Finney's turn as Arthur Seaton practically defined the archetypal working-class yob who is just smart enough to know that his life is going nowhere, but not sharp enough to do anything about it… Saturday Night and Sunday Morning can't escape being a product of its time, but its intelligence and rich store of talent make it powerful and relevant for any generation." - Mark Deming, All MovieSelected by Andrew Haigh, Jean-Pierre Garcia, Samantha Morton, Les Blair, David Roland.

Sauve qui peut (la vie)

1980 / France-Switzerland / 87m / Col / Psychological Drama, Urban DramaIsabelle Huppert, Jacques Dutronc, Nathalie Baye, Roland Amstutz, Cecile Tanner, Anna Baldaccini, Roger Jendly, Fred Personne, Nicole Jacquet, Dore De Rosa"Jean-Luc Godard calls this 1980 production his “second first film”—which means both a return to narrative after his brilliant documentary-theoretical work in the 70s and a complete clearing of the decks. You feel him questioning his entire life here, his most basic impulses and ideals, and his honesty is devastating… Of course, the film's substantial artistry belies Godard's self-negation: with his formal, four-part ordering of the narration, the tension he establishes and exploits between sound track and image, and his use of slow motion to analyze and abstract the action, Godard pulls an aesthetic victory from the jaws of utter nihilism." - Dave Kehr, Chicago ReaderSelected by Evans Chan, Ewa Mazierska, Richard Kwietniowski, Jean-Michel Frodon, Frédéric Maire.

Saving Private Ryan

1998 / USA / 169m / Col / War, Combat FilmTom Hanks, Tom Sizemore, Matt Damon, Edward Burns, Barry Pepper, Adam Goldberg, Vin Diesel, Giovanni Ribisi, Ted Danson, Dennis Farina"Since the end of World War II and the virtual death of the western, the combat film has disintegrated into a showcase for swagger, cynicism, obscenely overblown violence and hollow, self-serving victories. Now, with stunning efficacy, Spielberg turns back the clock. He restores passion and meaning to the genre with such whirlwind force that he seems to reimagine it entirely, dazzling with the breadth and intensity of that imagination. No received notions, dramatic or ideological, intrude on this achievement. This film simply looks at war as if war had not been looked at before." - Janet Maslin, The New York TimesSelected by Mamoru Oshii, Chad Stahelski, Adam Carolla, Griffin Dunne, Domingos Oliveira.

Sawdust and Tinsel

1953 / Sweden / 92m / BW / Drama, Psychological DramaHarriet Andersson, Ake Gronberg, Hasse Ekman, Anders Ek, Gudrun Brost, Annika Tretow, Erik Strandmark, Gunnar Bjornstrand, Curt Lowgren, Kiki"Ingmar Bergman presents the battle of the sexes as a ramshackle, grotesque carnival in Sawdust and Tinsel, one of the late master’s most vivid early works. The story of the charged relationship between a turn-of-the-century traveling circus owner (Grönberg) and his performer girlfriend (Andersson), the film features dreamlike detours and twisted psychosexual power plays that presage the director’s Smiles of a Summer Night and The Seventh Seal, works that would soon change the landscape of art cinema forever." - The Criterion CollectionSelected by Matti Kassila, John Sayles, Alejandro G. Calvo, Catherine Breillat, Eva Zaoralova.

Scarecrow

1973 / USA / 108m / Col / Drama, Road MovieGene Hackman, Al Pacino, Dorothy Tristan, Ann Wedgeworth, Richard Lynch, Eileen Brennan, Penelope Allen, Richard Hackman, Al Cingolani, Rutanya Alda"At the time of its release, Scarecrow was considered a commercial flop, and was shortsightedly written off by many critics as just another rambling buddy/road movie in the register of Easy Rider… Yet the passing years have proven Scarecrow's continuing appeal as a low-key character study, a downbeat ode to the downtrodden, an elegy for the American dream gone sour. Director Jerry Schatzberg and DP Vilmos Zsigmond craft a visually rich and evocative film as attuned to the rhapsodic vistas of the American pastoral as it is to the squalid dive bars and inhumane work farms that provide the grungy backdrop for screenwriter Garry Michael White's loose-limbed drama." - Budd Wilkins, Slant MagazineSelected by David Gordon Green, Marian Crisan, Vincent Gallo, Nobuhiro Yamashita, Ricardo Darín.

Scarface

1983 / USA / 170m / Col / Crime Thriller, Gangster FilmAl Pacino, Steven Bauer, Michelle Pfeiffer, Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio, Robert Loggia, Miriam Colon, F. Murray Abraham, Paul Shenar, Harris Yulin, Angel Salazar"Brian De Palma's Scarface moves the iconic rise and fall crime opera from the tommy-gun gangster wars of the prohibition era to the cocaine wars of Florida in the eighties. In the process, De Palma, screenwriter Oliver Stone and star Al Pacino carved out a film that redefined a generation of gangster cinema… It's a whole new spin on the immigrant story and the American Dream as an underworld nightmare and a fitting bookend to the two Godfather films… De Palma directs it as a blood-drenched thug opera, a mix of the graceful and the garish with Pacino's guttural thug-in-a-suit spitting out dialogue like broken glass in a harsh Cuban accent." - Sean Axmaker, MSN MoviesSelected by Antoine Fuqua, Brett Ratner, Matthew Vaughn, Niki Caro, Sean Baker.

Scenes from a Marriage

1973 / Sweden / 168m / Col / Drama, Marriage DramaLiv Ullmann, Erland Josephson, Bibi Andersson, Jan Malmsjo, Gunnel Lindblom, Anita Wall, Barbro Hiort af Ornas, Lena Bergman, Wenche Foss, Rosanna Mariano"Though edited down (under Bergman's supervision) from a six-part series originally made for TV, this remains an exhaustive study of the doubt, despair, confusion and loneliness experienced by a woman (Ullmann) when she learns that her fickle husband (Josephson) is having an affair. Bergman, as in Face to Face, is here at his most stylistically stark: very little actually happens (much of the film consists of conversations in rooms), so that it's left to the performers (all superb, and mostly framed by Sven Nykvist in revealing close-ups) to bring the litany of pain to life. And they do, with the result that the film is an uncompromisingly harrowing and honest account of male-female relationships." - Geoff Andrew, Time OutSelected by Sarah Polley, Asghar Farhadi, Nuri Bilge Ceylan, Neil LaBute, Dave Calhoun.

Scorpio Rising

1964 / USA / 29m / Col / Avant-garde-Experimental, Surrealist FilmBruce Byron, Ernie Allo, Frank Carifi, Steve Crandell, Johnny Dodds, Johnny Sapienza, Bill Dorfman, John Palone, Barry Lubin"Scorpio Rising is a pop-art collage of found artifacts which submerges itself in the chrome-and-leather, skull-and-swastika iconography of the motorcycle cult that provides its subject… Anger's manipulations of the culturally overloaded imagery of Nazism, sado-masochism, and the occult finally result in a film which refuses to conform to any dominant, edifying reading whatsoever—an almost unparalleled achievement which should earn Scorpio Rising an enduring place in the artistic annals of the 1960s, a decade remembered for the challenges it posed to ruling ideology. - Ed Lowry, Film ReferenceSelected by Gaspar Noé, Rebecca Shatwell, Ben Walters, Fernando F. Croce, Haden Guest.

The Searchers

1956 / USA / 119m / Col / Western, Revisionist WesternJohn Wayne, Jeffrey Hunter, Vera Miles, Ward Bond, Natalie Wood, Hank Worden, Henry Brandon, Harry Carey Jr., Olive Carey, John Qualen"We may still be waiting for the Great American Novel, but John Ford gave us the Great American Film in 1956. The Searchers gathers the deepest concerns of American literature, distilling 200 years of tradition in a way available only to popular art, and with a beauty available only to a supreme visual poet like Ford. Through the central image of the frontier, the meeting point of wilderness and civilization, Ford explores the divisions of our national character, with its search for order and its need for violence, its spirit of community and its quest for independence." - Dave Kehr, Chicago ReaderSelected by Geoffrey Macnab, Carlos F. Heredero, Christopher Frayling, Dave Kehr, David Stratton.

The Seasons

1975 / USSR / 29m / BW / Documentary"Vremena goda, Peleshian's first to eschew archival footage in favor of footage shot by his cinematographer Mikhail Vartanov, opens with a shepherd in a raging river, struggling to keep hold of his sheep; the rest of the film continues its downward plunge with more shepherds sliding down cliff faces with more sheep, farmers dragging huge haystacks down alarming inclines, and so on. The sense of hurtling motion, of life unstoppable, of energy and will pulling and shoving forward and down is overwhelming. Peleshian scores the whole thing to Vivaldi's Four Seasons, of course (with additional use of Armenian folk music); I can't imagine anything else will do." - Noel Vera, Critic After DarkSelected by Pietro Marcello, Edwin Mak, Elena Oroz, Michael Baute, Rhidian Davis.

Second Breath

1966 / France / 144m / BW / Crime Thriller, CaperLino Ventura, Paul Meurisse, Raymond Pellegrin, Christine Fabrega, Marcel Bozzuffi, Paul Frankeur, Denis Manuel, Jean Negroni, Michel Constantin, Pierre Zimmer"Despite its troubled production history—it was shot in two stages in Melville’s studio and various Marseille and Paris locations—it is a masterful work that ultimately brought to a close what Melville himself described as a period of several years “in the wilderness.” Despite the importance of Le deuxième souffle to understanding Melville’s career, it has remained one of his most underrated, and least examined, films... Ultimately, Le deuxième souffle offers one of the richest and starkest portraits of the Melvillean universe." - Adrian Danks, The Criterion CollectionSelected by Mika Kaurismäki, Iain Sinclair, Paul Mayersberg, F.J. Ossang, Geoff Andrew.See also 1,000 Noir Films.

The Servant

1963 / UK / 115m / BW / Drama, Psychological DramaDirk Bogarde, James Fox, Wendy Craig, Sarah Miles, Catherine Lacey, Richard Vernon, Ann Firbank, Patrick Magee, Harold Pinter, Doris Knox"Given Losey's abiding interest in relations of class and power it is hardly surprising that he should have been drawn to this story of a servant, Barrett, who is taken on by an effete young Englishman, Tony, and gradually takes over his master's life… Pinter's spare, elliptical dialogue, with its pauses and silences, is the perfect vehicle for expressing the unspoken dynamics of human relationships and for establishing a pervasive sense of menace and unease. More important still, however, is Losey's masterly direction, elaborate yet tightly controlled and never merely decorative." - Julian Petley, Film ReferenceSelected by Claire Monk, Andris Feldmanis, Guy Désiré Yameogo, Gore Verbinski, Nanouk Leopold.

Seven Chances

1925 / USA / 56m / BW / Comedy of Errors, Romantic ComedyBuster Keaton, Ruth Dwyer, T. Roy Barnes, Snitz Edwards, Frances Raymond, Erwin Connelly, Jules Cowles, Jean Arthur, Lori Bara, Bartine Burkett"Less ambitious and less concerned with plastic values than the best of Keaton, this is nevertheless a dazzlingly balletic comedy in which Buster has a matter of hours to acquire the wife on which a seven million dollar inheritance depends. Having insulted his sweetheart by explaining the necessity of marriage, been turned down by seven possible candidates… he advertises - only to find a horde of applicants besieging the church. From this leisurely start, the film takes off into a fantastically elaborate, gloriously inventive chase sequence, in which Buster escapes the mob of pursuing harridans only to find an escalating avalanche of rocks taking over at his heels as he hurtles downhill. - Tom Milne, Time OutSelected by Richard Dyer, Mike Leigh, Inácio Araújo, Manuel J. Lombardo, Terry Jones.

Seven Women

1966 / USA / 87m / Col / Drama, Period FilmAnne Bancroft, Margaret Leighton, Sue Lyon, Flora Robson, Mildred Dunnock, Betty Field, Anna Lee, Eddie Albert, Mike Mazurki, Woody Strode"A commercial disaster when it came out in 1966, generally relegated to the lower half of double bills and dismissed by most critics, John Ford's magnificent last feature is surely one of his greatest not merely for its unsentimental distillation of Fordian themes, but for the telegraphic urgency and passion of its style, which is aided rather than handicapped by the stripped-down studio sets. Set in 1935, the film effectively transposes the gender and settings of many of his classic westerns to the apocalyptic last days of a female missionary outpost in China, which is about to be invaded by Mongolian warriors (including Mike Mazurki and Woody Strode)." - Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago ReaderSelected by Bernard Eisenschitz, Jean Narboni, Fred Camper, Marcos Uzal, João Gabriel Paixão.

Seventh Heaven

1927 / USA / 119m / BW / Romance, MelodramaJanet Gaynor, Charles Farrell, Ben Bard, Albert Gran, David Butler, Marie Mosquini, Gladys Brockwell, Emile Chautard, Jessie Haslett, George E. Stone"Seventh Heaven is probably Frank Borzage's most famous film, the one where all his principles of mystical romance come together most distinctively. This exquisite tale of romance between street waif/prostitute Diane (Gaynor) and Montmartre sewage worker Chico (Farrell) stresses the redemptive side of couplehood so persuasively that otherworldly connotations, like the strong ray of light that literally shines down on them after their various trials, seem only fair and natural. Borzage ennobles their poverty-stricken lives to such an extent that even the cruelties of war don't stand a chance when they are working against it together." - Dan Callahan, Slant MagazineSelected by David Robinson, Catherine Gautier, Isaki Lacuesta, Manuel Asín, Tim Wong.

Shadow of a Doubt

1943 / USA / 108m / BW / Thriller, Psychological ThrillerJoseph Cotten, Teresa Wright, Macdonald Carey, Henry Travers, Patricia Collinge, Hume Cronyn, Wallace Ford, Edna May Wonacott, Irving Bacon, Charles Bates"One of Hitchcock's finest films of the '40s, with Cotten as the infamous 'Merry Widow' murderer, who takes refuge with the small-town family of his sister (Collinge). Focusing on adoring niece Wright's dawning realisation that her kind, generous and handsome uncle is in fact a cold and cynical killer, the film is not only psychologically intriguing (both niece and uncle are called Charlie, and he arrives in town as if in answer to her prayers for excitement), but a sharp dissection of middle American life, in its own quiet way an ancestor of Blue Velvet... Funny, gripping, and expertly shot by Joe Valentine, it's a small but memorable gem." - Geoff Andrew, Time OutSelected by Guillermo del Toro, Diane Negra, Noël Burch, James Mangold, Sam Ho.See also 1,000 Noir Films.

Shadows

1959 / USA / 87m / BW / Drama, Ensemble FilmLelia Goldoni, Ben Carruthers, Hugh Hurd, Anthony Ray, Rupert Crosse, Dennis Sallas, Tom Allen, David Pokitillow, David Jones, Pir Marini"John Cassavetes’ directorial debut revolves around an interracial romance between Lelia (Goldoni), a light-skinned black woman living in New York City with her two brothers, and Tony (Ray), a white man. The relationship crumbles when Tony meets Lelia’s brother Hugh (Hurd), a talented dark-skinned jazz singer struggling to find work, and discovers the truth about Lelia’s racial heritage. Shot on location in Manhattan with a cast and crew made up primarily of amateurs, Cassavetes’ Shadows is a visionary work that is widely considered the forerunner of the American independent film movement." - The Criterion CollectionSelected by Carlos Diegues, Adam Hyman, Andrew Šprah, Balazs Vizer, Bruce Jenkins.

Shadows of Our Forgotten Ancestors

1964 / USSR / 97m / Col / Drama, Period FilmIvan Mikolajchuk, Larisa Kadochnikova, Tatyana Bestayeva, Spartak Bagashvili, Nikolai Grinko, Leonid Yengibarov, Nina Alisova, Aleksandr Gaj, Neonila Gnepovskaya, A. Raydanov"Sergei Paradjanov's masterpiece won a raft of awards at international film festivals. Yet it was scarcely seen in his homeland, as much through studio hostility as official disapproval… However, Paradjanov's sole purpose was to challenge conventional methods of screen storytelling and redefine the audience's relationship to the moving image. Thus, he deconstructed the very processes of narration and representation, so that every frame confounded the viewer's expectation and forced them to reappraise both the action itself and their approach to spectatorship… Pure genius." - David Parkinson, EmpireSelected by Peter Strickland, Amit Dutta, Andriy Khalpakhchi, Bauyrzhan Nogerbek, Masoud Amralla Al Ali.

Shane

1953 / USA / 118m / Col / Western, Psychological WesternAlan Ladd, Jean Arthur, Van Heflin, Brandon de Wilde, Jack Palance, Ben Johnson, Edgar Buchanan, Elisha Cook Jr., Emile Meyer, John Dierkes"The plot of Shane is a masterpiece of simplicity… Shane tries to encapsulate the cultural ethos of the Western. Rather than avoiding the clichés, platitudes and stereotypes of the genre, Shane pursues and embraces them. With the exception of a saloon girl and an Indian attack, all of the ingredients of the typical Western are present: the wide open spaces, the ranchers feuding with the farmers, the homesteading family trying to build a life, the rival gunman, the absence of law… Embodying as it does the look and feel of the Western, Shane becomes an essential rarity; it not only preserves but honors our belief in our heritage." - Stephen E. Bowles, Film ReferenceSelected by José Mojica Marins, John Ewing, Patrick Russell, Tony Macklin, Charles Burnett.

The Shawshank Redemption

1994 / USA / 142m / Col / Drama, Prison FilmTim Robbins, Morgan Freeman, Bob Gunton, William Sadler, Clancy Brown, Gil Bellows, Mark Rolston, James Whitmore, Jeffrey DeMunn, Larry Brandenburg"Darabont's adaptation of a Stephen King novella is a throwback to the kind of serious, literate drama Hollywood used to make (Birdman of Alcatraz, say), though the big spiritual resolution takes some swallowing… Against this weighs the pleasure of discovering a first-time director with evident respect for the intelligence of his audience, brave enough to let character details accumulate without recourse to the fast-forward button. Darabont plays the long game and wins: this is an engrossing, superbly acted yarn, while the Shawshank itself is a truly formidable mausoleum." - Tom Charity, Time OutSelected by Li Shaohong, Christopher Nolan, Cameron Crowe, Karen Oughton, Heather Graham.

She Wore a Yellow Ribbon

1949 / USA / 103m / Col / Western, Cavalry FilmJohn Wayne, Joanne Dru, John Agar, Ben Johnson, Harry Carey Jr., Victor McLaglen, Mildred Natwick, George O'Brien, Arthur Shields, Michael Dugan"Of all John Ford's lyrical films, this 1949 feature is the one that most nearly leaves narrative behind; it is pure theme and variation, centered on the figure of a retiring cavalry officer (John Wayne, playing with strength and conviction a man well beyond his actual age). The screenplay (by Frank Nugent and Laurence Stallings) is entirely episodic, and it ends in a magnificently sustained series of anticlimaxes, suggesting it could spin out forever. In Ford's superbly creative hands, it becomes perhaps the only avant-garde film ever made about the importance of tradition." - Dave Kehr, Chicago ReaderSelected by Adriano Aprà, Gavin Smith, Jean-Louis Leutrat, Jim McBride, Bertrand Tavernier.

Sherlock Jr.

1924 / USA / 44m / BW / Comedy, SlapstickBuster Keaton, Kathryn McGuire, Joe Keaton, Erwin Connelly, Ward Crane, Jane Connelly, George Davis, Doris Deane, Ruth Holly, Kewpie Morgan"Keaton's third feature under his own steam is an incredible technical accomplishment, but also an almost Pirandellian exploration of the nature of cinematic reality. Buster plays a cinema projectionist, framed for theft by a jealous rival for his girl's hand, who daydreams himself into life as a daring detective. In an unforgettable sequence, Buster (actually fallen asleep beside the projector) forces his way onto the screen and into the movie he is projecting, only to find himself beset by perils and predicaments as the action around him changes in rapid montage… It leaves Chaplin standing." - Tom Milne, Time OutSelected by Carrie Rickey, Chris Darke, Gilberto Perez, Kenneth Turan, Michael Atkinson.

The Shining

1980 / USA / 142m / Col / Horror, Haunted House FilmJack Nicholson, Shelley Duvall, Danny Lloyd, Scatman Crothers, Barry Nelson, Philip Stone, Joseph Turkel, Anne Jackson, David Baxt, Lia Beldam"The Shining, Stanley Kubrick's indelible take on both the horror genre and the popular fiction of Stephen King, is both a radical distillation of its source novel's densely stuffed ghosts-and-gore imagery as well as a conflation of its hidden central theme of the true-life horrors of domestic abuse. The result is a film that, though it ignores almost every major spook-show episode in the novel (nope, no teeming wasp's nest here), enhances everything that's legitimately unnerving about King's book... Kubrick's The Shining dwells at the outer limits of what can be thought of as a genre film, stretching the definition, filling it out, leaving it richer in its wake." - Eric Henderson, Slant MagazineSelected by Ben Wheatley, Ti West, Gregg Araki, Jonathan Romney, Juan Antonio Bayona.

Shoah

1985 / France / 566m / Col / Military & War, DocumentarySimon Srebnik, Michael Podchlebnik, Motke Zaidl, Hanna Zaidl, Jan Piwonski, Itzhak Dugin, Richard Glazer, Paula Biren, Pana Pietyra, Pan Filipowicz"Lanzmann's great nine-hour documentary on the Holocaust… Despite its length, it is one of the most consistently engrossing and powerful movies ever made. Lanzmann doesn't utilize old newsreel footage or archival material. His emphasis, in interviews and footage he shot over five years, is entirely on the words and faces of the eyewitnesses to the "Final Solution" – Jewish survivors of the camps, Germans and Poles who worked in the camps, old Nazi officials… With patient, horrible deliberateness, he repeatedly circles back to images of train tracks to the death camps, to pastoral countrysides camouflaging mass graves." - Peter Rainer, Christian Science MonitorSelected by Amy Taubin, Berenice Reynaud, Carlos F. Heredero, Gavin Smith, Gillies MacKinnon.

Sholay

1975 / India / 162m / Col / Action, Adventure DramaDharmendra, Sanjeev Kumar, Hema Malini, Amitabh Bachchan, Jaya Bhaduri, Amjad Khan, A.K. Hangal, Satyendra Kapoor, Iftekhar, Leela Mishra"Sholay (Flames), stars the godfather of Bollywood heroes Amitabh Bachchan at his best and is one of the most successful films of the 70s. Often described as a "curry" western, Sholay became a milestone in Indian cinema with an all-star cast, cult dialogue, stylish cinematography and a soundtrack that's still enjoyable today. It's the perfect entry point for any Bollywood virgins… Fully-rounded characters and a simple narrative make three hours pass fairly quickly… All performances are polished but Amjad Khan's debut as the menacing Gabbar Singh deserves special mention, setting new standards for Bollywood villains. It's a movie that you can watch again and again, and hardcore Bollywood fans do. But even if you just watch Sholay once, you won't be disappointed." - Dharmesh Rajput, BBCSelected by Naman Ramachandran, Lalitha Gopalan, Anupama Chopra, Anees Bazmee, Jai Arjun Singh.

The Shop Around the Corner

1940 / USA / 97m / BW / Comedy, RomanceJames Stewart, Margaret Sullavan, Frank Morgan, Joseph Schildkraut, Sara Haden, Felix Bressart, William Tracy, Inez Courtney, Charles Halton, Charles Smith"This 1940 film is one of Ernst Lubitsch's finest and most enduring works, a romantic comedy of dazzling range that takes place almost entirely within the four walls of a leather-goods store in prewar Budapest. James Stewart is the earnest, slightly awkward young manager; Margaret Sullavan is the new sales clerk who gets on his nerves… The romance proceeds through Lubitsch's brilliant deployment of point of view, allowing the audience to enter the perceptions of each individual character at exactly the right moment to develop maximum sympathy and suspense." - Dave Kehr, Chicago ReaderSelected by David Thomson, Juan José Campanella, Molly Haskell, Scott Foundas, Whit Stillman.

A Short Film About Killing

1987 / Poland / 85m / Col / Drama, CrimeMiroslaw Baka, Krzysztof Globisz, Jan Tesarz, Zbigniew Zapasiewicz, Barbara Dziekan, Aleksander Bednarz, Jerzy Zass, Zdzislaw Tobiasz, Artur Barcis, Krystyna Janda"A remarkable Polish feature, expanded by Krzysztof Kieslowski from an episode in his Decalogue, in which each segment illustrates one of the Ten Commandments; the complete series is one of the key works in contemporary world cinema. A Short Film About Killing might be called terminally Polish in its bleak handling of a brutal murder and the public execution of the murderer; winner of the jury prize at Cannes, it’s possibly the most powerful movie ever made about the death penalty." - Jonathan RosenbaumSelected by Malgorzata Szumowska, Cyrus Frisch, Richard Eyre, Khalo Matabane, Marlena Lukasiak.

The Silence

1963 / Sweden / 96m / BW / Psychological Drama, Family DramaIngrid Thulin, Gunnel Lindblom, Jorgen Lindstrom, Birger Malmsten, Hakan Jahnberg"Two sisters—the sickly, intellectual Ester (Thulin) and the sensual, pragmatic Anna (Lindblom)—travel by train with Anna’s young son Johan (Lindstrom) to a foreign country seemingly on the brink of war. Attempting to cope with their alien surroundings, the sisters resort to their personal vices while vying for Johan’s affection, and in so doing sabotage any hope for a future together. Regarded as one of the most sexually provocative films of its day, Ingmar Bergman’s The Silence offers a brilliant, disturbing vision of emotional isolation in a suffocating spiritual void." - The Criterion CollectionSelected by Ulrich Seidl, Götz Spielmann, Jean-Stephane Sauvaire, José Luis Rebordinos, Lenny Abrahamson.

Silent Light

2007 / Mexico-France-Netherlands / 136m / Col / Psychological Drama, Rural DramaCornelio Wall, Miriam Toews, Maria Pankratz, Peter Wall, Elisabeth Wall, Jacobo Klassen, Irma Thiessen, Alfredo Thiessen, Daniel Thiessen, Autghe Loewen"A fictional story about everyday rapture in an isolated Mennonite community in northern Mexico — and performed by a cast of mostly Mennonite nonprofessionals — the film was written, directed and somehow willed into unlikely existence by the extravagantly talented Carlos Reygadas, whose immersion in this exotic world feels so deep and true that it seems like an act of faith. Mr. Reygadas’s faith may be more rooted in his own gifts than in God, but it’s the sheer intensity of this belief — which he confirms with every camera movement — that invests his film with such feeling." - Manohla Dargis, The New York TimesSelected by Zhao Liang, Lisandro Alonso, Nadav Lapid, Andrzej Kolodynski, Daniel Frampton.See also The 21st Century's Most Acclaimed Films.

Simon of the Desert

1965 / Mexico / 43m / BW / Satire, Religious ComedyClaudio Brook, Silvia Pinal, Hortensia Santovena, Luis Aceves Castaneda, Enrique Alvarez Felix, Antonio Bravo, Enrique del Castillo, Jesus Fernandez, Enrique Garcia Alvarez, Eduardo MacGregor"Simon of the Desert is Luis Buñuel’s wicked and wild take on the life of devoted ascetic Saint Simeon Stylites, who waited atop a pillar surrounded by a barren landscape for six years, six months, and six days, in order to prove his devotion to God. Yet the devil, in the figure of the beautiful Silvia Pinal, huddles below, trying to tempt him down. A skeptic’s vision of human conviction, Buñuel’s short and sweet satire is one of the master filmmaker’s most renowned works of surrealism." - The Criterion CollectionSelected by Daniel V. Villamediana, Frances Morgan, Gonçalo Tocha, Haden Guest, Alejandro Díaz.

Singin' in the Rain

1952 / USA / 102m / Col / Musical, Showbiz ComedyGene Kelly, Donald O'Connor, Debbie Reynolds, Jean Hagen, Millard Mitchell, Cyd Charisse, Douglas Fowley, Rita Moreno, Madge Blake, King Donovan"There is no movie musical more fun than Singin' in the Rain, and few that remain as fresh over the years. Its originality is all the more startling if you reflect that only one of its songs was written new for the film, that the producers plundered MGM's storage vaults for sets and props, and that the movie was originally ranked below An American in Paris, which won a best picture Oscar. The verdict of the years knows better than Oscar: Singin' in the Rain is a transcendent experience, and no one who loves movies can afford to miss it." - Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-TimesSelected by Alexander Horwath, Carrie Rickey, Francis Ford Coppola, David Stratton, Edward Buscombe.

Smiles of a Summer Night

1955 / Sweden / 108m / BW / Comedy, Ensemble FilmEva Dahlbeck, Ulla Jacobsson, Harriet Andersson, Margit Carlquist, Gunnar Bjornstrand, Jarl Kulle, Ake Fridell, Bjorn Bjelvenstam, Naima Wifstrand, Bibi Andersson"After fifteen films that received mostly local acclaim, the 1955 comedy Smiles of a Summer Night at last ushered in an international audience for Ingmar Bergman. In turn-of-the-century Sweden, four men and four women attempt to navigate the laws of attraction. During a weekend in the country, the women collude to force the men’s hands in matters of the heart, exposing their pretensions and insecurities along the way. Chock-full of flirtatious propositions and sharp witticisms delivered by such Swedish screen legends as Gunnar Björnstrand and Harriet Andersson, Smiles of a Summer Night is one of cinema’s great erotic comedies." - The Criterion CollectionSelected by Derek Malcolm, David Stratton, Laurent Jullier, Marc Cerisuelo, David Edelstein.

Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs

1937 / USA / 83m / Col / Children's Fantasy, Animated MusicalAdriana Caselotti, Harry Stockwell, Lucille LaVerne, Moroni Olsen, Billy Gilbert, Pinto Colvig, Otis Harlan, Scotty Mattraw, Roy Atwell, Stuart Buchanan"Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs was immediately hailed as a masterpiece. (Sergei Eisenstein called it the greatest movie ever made.) It remains the jewel in Disney's crown, and although inflated modern grosses have allowed other titles to pass it in dollar totals, it is likely that more people have seen it than any other animated feature. The word genius is easily used and has been cheapened, but when it is used to describe Walt Disney, reflect that he conceived of this film, in all of its length, revolutionary style and invention, when there was no other like it--and that to one degree or another, every animated feature made since owes it something." - Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-TimesSelected by Jan Troell, Michel Hazanavicius, Terry Jones, Christopher Frayling, José Luis Borau.

Some Came Running

1958 / USA / 136m / Col / Drama, AmericanaFrank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Shirley MacLaine, Martha Hyer, Arthur Kennedy, Nancy Gates, Leora Dana, Betty Lou Keim, Larry Gates, Steven Peck"Vincente Minnelli turns the James Jones novel into one of his finest and most garish melodramas, with Dean Martin, Frank Sinatra, and Shirley MacLaine struggling to stay alive in the hopelessly small town of Madison, Indiana. Minnelli has said that he based his visual style on the inside of a jukebox, and the film is a sort of neon epiphany. The final sequence, set at a carnival, remains an object lesson in the expressive use of CinemaScope." - Dave Kehr, Chicago ReaderSelected by Chris Fujiwara, Ignatiy Vishnevetsky, Roberto Manassero, Richard Linklater, Carlo Chatrian.

Some Like it Hot

1959 / USA / 119m / BW / Comedy, FarceTony Curtis, Jack Lemmon, Marilyn Monroe, George Raft, Pat O'Brien, Joe E. Brown, Nehemiah Persoff, Joan Shawlee, Billy Gray, George E. Stone"Wilder's 1959 comedy is one of the enduring treasures of the movies, a film of inspiration and meticulous craft, a movie that's about nothing but sex and yet pretends it's about crime and greed. It is underwired with Wilder's cheerful cynicism, so that no time is lost to soppiness and everyone behaves according to basic Darwinian drives. When sincere emotion strikes these characters, it blindsides them: Curtis thinks he wants only sex, Monroe thinks she wants only money, and they are as astonished as delighted to find they want only each other." - Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-TimesSelected by Christopher Frayling, Jan Troell, Joseph McBride, Kevin MacDonald, Laurence Kardish.

The Son

2002 / Belgium-France / 103m / Col / Drama, Social Problem FilmOlivier Gourmet, Morgan Marinne, Isabella Soupart, Nassim Hassaini, Kevin Leroy, Felicien Pitsaer, Remy Renaud, Annette Closset, Fabian Marnette, Pierre Nisse"This potent Belgian feature by brothers Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne is every bit as good as their La promesse and Rosetta. Unlike them it can't be described in detail without telegraphing the plot's carefully structured exposition, but it involves a carpenter and teacher at a vocational workshop (Gourmet) who takes on a 16-year-old boy as an apprentice, with cataclysmic consequences… The Dardennes' extremely physical and visceral camera style plunges the viewer into an emotional maelstrom, and their subtle, unpredictable sense of character is predicated not on coercion of the audience but on an extraordinary respect for the viewer as well as the characters." - Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago ReaderSelected by Celina Murga, Daniel Frampton, Eva af Geijerstam, Marc Munden, Andrew Droz Palermo.See also The 21st Century's Most Acclaimed Films.

Songs from the Second Floor

2000 / Sweden-France-Denmark-Norway-Germany / 98m / Col / Surrealist Film, Black ComedyLars Nordh, Stefan Larsson, Hanna Eriksson, Bengt C.W. Carlsson, Torbjorn Fahlstrom, Sten Andersson, Rolando Nunez, Lucio Vucina, Peter Roth, Klas-Gosta Olsson"Swedish director Roy Andersson presents us with loosely connected scenes from the end of the world, in a series of bizarre tableaux unfolding in weirdly lucid dream-landscapes of vast plains, endless corridors and vertiginous perspective lines - each scene filmed in one long take from a static camera... Andersson has something of Woody Allen and Terry Gilliam, but with strains of anarchy and melancholy that are unique. Here is a film to try the patience of the non-believer, but astonish everyone else. Some might find it a curate's egg of strangeness. But it's one of the Fabergé variety." - Peter Bradshaw, The GuardianSelected by Zhao Liang, Pirjo Honkasalo, Mike Leigh, Andrew Kotting, Lone Scherfig.See also The 21st Century's Most Acclaimed Films.

The Sorrow and the Pity

1969 / France-Switzerland-Germany / 260m / BW / Military & War, DocumentaryGeorges Bidault, Matthaus Bleibinger, Charles Braun, Maurice Buckmaster, Emile Coulaudon, Emmanuel d'Astier de la Vigerie, Rene de Chambrun, Christian de la Maziere, Jacques Duclos, R. Du Jonchay"The Nazi occupation of France lasted more than four years. Marcel Ophuls' landmark 1969 documentary boils it down to a more manageable 265 minutes - which still amounts to an awful lot of sorrow and a veritable ocean of pity. Strange to note, then, that the film is so boldly conceived, richly textured and beautifully paced that its marathon running time feels more like a sprint… Employing a seamless blend of contemporary interviews, newsreel footage and propaganda films, it paints an engrossing portrait of a cowed and compromised nation, presided over by the Blimpish Marshal Pétain and serenaded by the honeyed tones of Maurice Chevalier." - Xan Brooks, The GuardianSelected by Jorge García, Laura Waddington, Karen Cooper, Kristy Matheson, Margaret Deriaz.

The Sound of Music

1965 / USA / 174m / Col / Musical, DramaJulie Andrews, Christopher Plummer, Eleanor Parker, Richard Haydn, Peggy Wood, Charmian Carr, Heather Menzies, Nicholas Hammond, Duane Chase, Angela Cartwright"It's hard to tune into The Sound of Music these days without being deafened by the noises off; that caterwauling chorus of adoration, ridicule, reverence and contempt that has dogged the film since its release back in 1965. But check your cynicism at the door: Robert Wise's adaptation of the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical still has a little soul in its bones, with its reactionary nature tempered by Ernest Lehman's supple screenplay, and its elephantine running-time eased by a set of songs that lodge in your system like hookworms." - Xan Brooks, The GuardianSelected by Adam McKay, Peter Whitehead, Jane Giles, Ole Bornedal, Slavoj Zizek.

Spione

1928 / Germany / 90m / BW / Thriller, Spy FilmRudolf Klein-Rogge, Gerda Maurus, Willy Fritsch, Lien Deyers, Louis Ralph, Craighall Sherry, Lupu Pick, Hertha von Walther, Fritz Rasp, Paul Horbiger"Disguises, transformations, multiples, a sketch of modern power networks whose ubiquitous reach borders on absurdity ... We are not far here from the highwire sensations and baroque convolutions offered today by the Mission: Impossible films. Rosenbaum is right to locate Spione within a tradition stretching from Louis Feuillade in the silent era through to ‘master plotters, from Hitchcock and Graham Greene to Rivette, Straub and Thomas Pynchon’. But it also has a crucial place within the history of the action film, the least critically attended to of all major genres. Like the first two Mabuse instalments, Spione is a great action film – and a masterpiece of popular art." - Adrian Martin, RougeSelected by Adriano Aprà, Jonathan Rosenbaum, Mariano Llinás, Keith Uhlich, Violeta Kovacsics.

Spring in a Small Town

1948 / China / 85m / BW / Drama, Romantic DramaWei Wei, Yu Shi, Li Wei, Chaoming Cui, Hongmei Zhang"The crowning achievement of one of China's finest directors, this unique film both reflects and dissects the mood of helpless impotence which afflicted many Chinese in the years after the war. After a 10-year absence, a doctor visits a married couple living in a bomb-scarred country town. The husband is a broken man, close to suicide; the wife was once his lover and they start to drift back into an affair under the nose of her husband. The sense of frustration and enervation is palpable, underlined by Fei's brilliant idea to use dissolves within scenes, but the counter-current of renascent desire makes this also a very sensual movie." - Tony Rayns, Time OutSelected by Garin Nugroho, Tony Rayns, Tsai Ming-liang, Zhang Yuan, Li Cheuk-to.

Stagecoach

1939 / USA / 96m / BW / Western, Traditional WesternJohn Wayne, Claire Trevor, Thomas Mitchell, John Carradine, Andy Devine, George Bancroft, Louise Platt, Donald Meek, Berton Churchill, Tim Holt"This is where it all started. John Ford’s smash hit and enduring masterpiece Stagecoach revolutionized the western, elevating it from B movie to the A-list and establishing the genre as we know it today. The quintessential tale of a group of strangers thrown together into extraordinary circumstances, Stagecoach features outstanding performances from Hollywood stalwarts Claire Trevor, John Carradine, and Thomas Mitchell, and, of course, John Wayne, in his first starring role for Ford, as the daredevil outlaw the Ringo Kid. Superbly shot and tightly edited, Stagecoach (Ford’s first trip to Monument Valley) is Hollywood storytelling at its finest." - The Criterion CollectionSelected by Glenn Kenny, Nelson Pereira dos Santos, Arturo Ripstein, Philip French, Charles Barr.

Stalker

1979 / USSR / 160m / Col-BW / Science Fiction, Psychological Sci-FiAleksandr Kajdanovsky, Anatoli Solonitsyn, Nikolai Grinko, Alisa Frejndlikh, Natasha Abramova, Ye. Kostin, R. Rendi, F. Yurma"The Stalker leads two men, the Writer and the Professor, across the Zone - a forbidden territory deep inside a police state - towards the Room, which can lay bare the devices and desires of your heart… The wettest, grimmest trek ever seen on film leads to nihilistic impasse - huddled in dirt, the discovery of faith seems impossible; and without faith, life outside the Zone, impossible. But hang on in to the ending, where a plain declaration of love and a vision of pure magic at least point the way to redemption. As always, Tarkovsky conjures images like you've never seen before; and as a journey to the heart of darkness, it's a good deal more persuasive than Coppola's." - Chris Peachment, Time OutSelected by Alex Garland, Wim Wenders, Neill Blomkamp, Glenn Kenny, Ari Folman.

Stand by Me

1986 / USA / 87m / Col / Drama, Coming-of-AgeWil Wheaton, River Phoenix, Corey Feldman, Jerry O'Connell, Richard Dreyfuss, Kiefer Sutherland, Casey Siemaszko, Gary Riley, Bradley Gregg, Jason Oliver"In Reiner's superior slice of teen nostalgia, Dreyfuss is the now middle-aged writer, looking back at the dear dead days beyond recall when he and a group of young friends ventured into the local woods where they believed a corpse was buried. Based on an (apparently) semi-autobiographical story by Stephen King, the film covers similar territory to countless other rites-of-passage dramas. The Ben E King theme song and all the imagery of tousled adolescents preening themselves like miniature James Deans rekindle memories of old jeans commercials, but the film is so well-observed and so energetically acted by its young cast that mawkishness is kept at bay." - Geoffrey Macnab, Time OutSelected by David Gordon Green, Jamie Graham, Simon Rumley, Oren Peli, Henry Joost & Ariel Schulman.

A Star is Born

1954 / USA / 154m / Col / Musical, Showbiz DramaJudy Garland, James Mason, Jack Carson, Charles Bickford, Tommy Noonan, Lucy Marlow, Amanda Blake, Irving Bacon, Hazel Shermet, James Brown"Brutally cut after its first release and further disfigured by the insertion of the long, tasteless production number “Born in a Trunk,” George Cukor's 1954 film somehow survives—and even touches greatness at times. Judy Garland gives everything she has as the young star on the way up; her performance is an emotional autobiography. And James Mason, as the aging star on the way out, balances her vulnerability with a tense distance, transcending the pathos his part was written for. This was Cukor's first complete film in color and his first in 'Scope: both elements are used with a bold assurance and perfect expressiveness." - Dave Kehr, Chicago ReaderSelected by Kevin Thomas, Mike D'Angelo, Linda Ruth Williams, Isild Le Besco, Shu Kei.

Star Wars

1977 / USA / 121m / Col / Science Fiction, Space AdventureMark Hamill, Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher, Peter Cushing, Alec Guinness, Peter Mayhew, David Prowse, Anthony Daniels, Kenny Baker, Phil Brown"Lucas's science fiction adventure is an exhilarating update of Flash Gordon, very much in the same half-jokey, half-earnest mood, but backed by special effects that, for once, really work and are intelligently integrated with the story. By this point, Lucas's film has been accused of everything from hazy characterization to crypto-fascism (the finale is, indeed, a restaging of Triumph of the Will), and it has become painfully clear that the film's apparent naivete is anything but—Lucas doesn't make a move without the market research to back him up. But it remains the most appealing film in the subgenre it launched, with its finger on something basic and satisfying." - Dave Kehr, Chicago ReaderSelected by Gareth Edwards, Matthew Vaughn, Jan Sverák, J.J. Abrams, David Michôd.

Steamboat Bill, Jr.

1928 / USA / 71m / BW / Adventure Comedy, SlapstickBuster Keaton, Ernest Torrence, Marion Byron, Tom McGuire, Tom Lewis, Joe Keaton"A marvellous comedy set in a lazy riverside town in the Deep South, with Buster as the foppish, city-educated boy who returns home to prove a grave disappointment to his father… Hilarious, of course, with both delicately observed jokes and energetically athletic stuntwork coursing through the movie. But what really delights is the detailed depiction of small town life, plus Keaton's comic awareness of his own persona; a sequence in which he and his father are buying a hat to replace his wimpy beret is a model of film comedy, played, remarkably, direct to camera." - Geoff Andrew, Time OutSelected by Sebastián Lelio, Gregg Araki, Pere Portabella, Agnès Devictor, Peter Scarlet.

Still Life

2006 / China-Hong Kong / 113m / Col / Drama, Social Problem FilmTao Zhao, Sanming Han, Hong Wei Wang, Zhou Lan, Yong Huang, Jianlin Peng, Zhubin Li"There’s politics in every one of cinematographer Yu Likwai’s superbly composed HD frames, but it’s feel that the former is after. And in the half-drowned town of Fengjie – the victim of the Yangtze river Three Gorges Project and capitalism as well as being the new home of rural Shanxi construction worker Han (Han Sanming) – the feeling isn’t good… In Still Life the director’s assurance is such that the barriers between documentary and fictional film are made to seem an irrelevance; you may find his film’s intimations of commonality – what we share as human beings – will surprise and move you in unexpected ways." - Wally Hammond, Time OutSelected by Walter Salles, Jean-Michel Frodon, Margaret Deriaz, Babak Jalali, Kenji Fujishima.See also The 21st Century's Most Acclaimed Films.

The Story of the Last Chrysanthemums

1939 / Japan / 143m / BW / Period Film, Romantic DramaShotaro Hanayagi, Kokichi Takada, Gonjuro Kawarazaki, Kakuko Mori, Tokusaburo Arashi, Yoko Umemura, Nobuko Fushimi, Kikuko Hanaoka, Kisho Hanayagi, Ryotaro Kawanami"Not the best known of Kenji Mizoguchi's period masterpieces, but conceivably the greatest. The plot, which oddly resembles that of There's No Business Like Show Business, concerns the rebellious son of a theatrical family devoted to Kabuki who leaves home for many years, perfects his art, aided by a working-class woman who loves him, and eventually returns… Never before nor after (with the possible exception of The 47 Ronin) would Mizoguchi's refusal to use close-ups have more telling effect, and the theme of female sacrifice that informs most of his major works is given a singular resonance and complexity here." - Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago ReaderSelected by Julian Graffy, Adriano Aprà, Andrei Ujica, Federico Rossin, Shinji Aoyama.

La Strada

1954 / Italy / 115m / BW / Melodrama, Romantic DramaGiulietta Masina, Anthony Quinn, Richard Basehart, Aldo Silvani, Marcella Rovere, Livia Venturini, Gustavo Giorgi, Kamadeva Yami, Mario Passante, Anna Primula"There has never been a face quite like that of Giulietta Masina. Her husband, the legendary Federico Fellini, directs her as Gelsomina in La strada, the film that launched them both to international stardom. Gelsomina is sold by her mother into the employ of Zampanò (Quinn), a brutal strongman in a traveling circus. When Zampanò encounters an old rival in highwire artist the Fool (Basehart), his fury is provoked to its breaking point. With La strada, Fellini left behind the familiar signposts of Italian neorealism for a poetic fable of love and cruelty, evoking brilliant performances and winning the hearts of audiences and critics worldwide." - The Criterion CollectionSelected by Krzysztof Zanussi, Adoor Gopalakrishnan, Ann Hui, Lynne Ramsay, Andrei Konchalovsky.

The Straight Story

1999 / USA-France-UK / 111m / Col / Americana, Road MovieRichard Farnsworth, Sissy Spacek, Everett McGill, Harry Dean Stanton, John Farley, Kevin Farley, Jane Galloway Heitz, Joseph A. Carpenter, Donald Wiegert, Tracey Maloney"In 1994 an elderly man named Alvin Straight undertook a long Midwestern journey riding on a lawnmower. It was an arduous feat, but not nearly as daunting as what David Lynch sets out to do in The Straight Story: make a slow-moving, folksy-looking, profoundly spiritual film that can hold an audience in absolute thrall. As the least likely filmmaker on the planet to pull off such a G-rated miracle, Lynch rises to this challenge with exhilarating vigor. Switching gears radically, bravely defying conventional wisdom about what it takes to excite moviegoers, Lynch presents the flip side of Blue Velvet and turns it into a supremely improbable triumph." - Janet Maslin, The New York TimesSelected by Maura McHugh, Fernando Meirelles, Roberto Manassero, Cedric Kahn, Damien Cassar.

Strangers on a Train

1951 / USA / 101m / BW / Psychological Thriller, Crime ThrillerFarley Granger, Robert Walker, Ruth Roman, Leo G. Carroll, Patricia Hitchcock, Laura Elliott, Marion Lorne, Howard St. John, Jonathan Hale, John Brown"Strangers on a Train is subversively ghoulish even by director Alfred Hitchcock's standards. The film, taken from an early novel by Patricia Highsmith, has an irresistibly pragmatic hook: Two men, both of whom are tormented by respective intimate persons they wish to off, will trade murders so as to properly prepare much-needed alibis… Strangers on a Train is also simply a great thriller, yet another illustration of Hitchcock's awe-inspiring ability to convey more with a single image than most directors can with minutes upon minutes of belabored set pieces." - Chuck Bowen, Slant MagazineSelected by Whit Stillman, Mike Newell, Pen-Ek Ratanaruang, Albert Maysles, Jonathan Lynn.See also 1,000 Noir Films.

Strangers When We Meet

1960 / USA / 117m / Col / Drama, MelodramaKirk Douglas, Kim Novak, Ernie Kovacs, Barbara Rush, Walter Matthau, Virginia Bruce, Kent Smith, Helen Gallagher, John Bryant, Roberta Shore"Strangers When We Meet is a melodramatic tale of extramarital unhappiness amongst fast-track suburbanites… The sympathetic treatment of the lead characters is enhanced by director Richard Quine’s judicious use of the widescreen frame, setting most shots at a comfortable distance from the characters and cutting to close-ups only at key moments in the plot… Strangers When We Meet never allows the glossiness of its presentation to erode a very affecting and astute appraisal of the state of suburbia before its inhabitants were swept away by the volatile energies of the decade to come." - David Sanjek, PopMattersSelected by James Gray, José Luis Garci, Jean-Loup Bourget, Eduardo Torres-Dulce, Fernando Mendez-Leite.

Street of Shame

Akasen chitai (original title)1956 / Japan / 96m / BW / Melodrama, Urban DramaMachiko Kyo, Aiko Mimasu, Ayako Wakao, Michiyo Kogure, Kumeko Urabe, Yasuko Kawakami, Hiroko Machida, Eitaro Shindo, Sadako Sawamura, Toranosuke Ogawa"For his final film, Mizoguchi brought a lifetime of experience to bear on the heartbreaking tale of a brothel full of women whose dreams are constantly being shattered by the socioeconomic realities surrounding them. Set in Tokyo’s Red Light District (the literal translation of the Japanese title), Street of Shame was so cutting, and its popularity so great, that when an antiprostitution law was passed in Japan just a few months after the film’s release, some said it was a catalyst." - The Criterion CollectionSelected by Jean-Pierre & Luc Dardenne, Miguel Marias, Bertrand Bonello, Louis Skorecki, Jesús Cortés.

Strike

1925 / USSR / 73m / BW / Political Drama, Historical EpicMaksim Shtraukh, Grigori Aleksandrov, Mikhail Gomorov, Alexander Antonov, Yudif Glizer, I. Ivanov, Ivan Klyukvin, Anatoli Kuznetsov, M. Mamin, Vladimir Uralsky"Eisenstein's first feature also remains his most watchable… The story itself is simple: workers clash violently with employers and police during a drawn-out factory strike provoked by the sacking and subsequent suicide of one of their number. But Eisenstein's methods are both complex and extraordinary: his decision to make the masses rather than any single individual his hero lends the film a truly epic sweep… The harshly beautiful imagery roots the movie effortlessly in down-to-earth reality, but its relentless energy and invention transform the whole thing into a raucous, rousing hymn to human dignity and courage." - Geoff Andrew, Time OutSelected by Paul Bush, David Forgacs, David Hanan, Alexei Balabanov, Peter Greenaway.

Stromboli

1950 / Italy / 107m / BW / Melodrama, Marriage DramaIngrid Bergman, Mario Vitale, Renzo Cesana, Mario Sponzo, Gaetano Famularo"Roberto Rossellini's 1949 masterwork. Ingrid Bergman plays a young woman displaced by the war, who marries a young fisherman in order to free herself from an internment camp. But she doesn't fit into his island society, and the more she tries to escape, the more spiritually isolated she feels. Rossellini's technique is thoroughly modern: it could have been made last week, or next year, by Jean-Luc Godard. The island setting is made solid and real, but the landscape still carries a powerful metaphorical force. The ending seems all the more beautiful for being dramatically arbitrary: grace enters Bergman's life at the brink of a volcano." - Dave Kehr, Chicago ReaderSelected by Adriano Aprà, Mariano Llinás, Alberto Pezzotta, Alan Pauls, Chung Sung-ill.

Stroszek

1977 / West Germany / 115m / Col / Comedy Drama, SatireBruno S., Eva Mattes, Clemens Scheitz, Wilhelm von Homburg, Burkhardt Driest, Clayton Szalpinski, Ely Rodriguez, Alfred Edel, Scott McKain, Ralph Wade"Werner Herzog's Stroszek easily qualifes as one of the weirdest features ever made. The premise - about a mentally-impaired German ex-con, a prostitute and a diminutive, wizened octogenarian scientist who collectively move from Berlin to rural Wisconsin and take up in a hideous prefabricated trailer - is unquestionably bizarre, but Stroszek is also, in its own idiosyncratic way, a brilliant, illuminating and heartfelt movie… The film never once feels difficult to watch; it qualifies as a tragedy of the deepest and most profound sort, with a heartbreaking ending, but Herzog lifts it from the pit of despair by blending the inherent sadness with a surfeit of warm-hearted human comedy that runs throughout much of the picture and that redeems it from the devastating, potentially crushing weight of sorrow." - Nathan Southern, AllmovieSelected by Debra Granik, Zhao Liang, Harmony Korine, David Lynch, Matt Boyd.

Subarnarekha

1965 / India / 143m / BW / DramaAbhi Bhattacharya, Madhabi Mukherjee, Satindra Bhattacharya, Bijon Bhattacharya, Indrani Chakrabarty, Sriman Tarun, Jahar Ray, Pitambar, Sriman Ashok Bhattacharya, Sita Mukherjee"Subarnarekha, made in 1962 but released in 1965 is the last in a trilogy examining the socio-economic implications of partition, the other two being Meghe Dhaka Tara (1960) and Komal Ghandhar (1961). It is also perhaps Ritwik Ghatak's most complex film… The film is aided with fine performances from Madhabi Mukherjee and Abhi Bhattacharya and special mention must be made of Bahadur Khan's evocatively haunting musical score. Sadly, like most of Ghatak's films, Subarnarekha was totally rejected by the public. Ironically, today the film is hailed as a classic and as an important landmark in the history of Indian Cinema." - UpperstallSelected by Tom Charity, Girish Shambu, Raqs Media Collective, Ashim Ahluwalia, Thomas Allenbach.

Sullivan's Travels

1941 / USA / 91m / BW / Comedy, SatireJoel McCrea, Veronica Lake, Robert Warwick, William Demarest, Franklin Pangborn, Porter Hall, Robert Greig, Eric Blore, Byron Foulger, Maggie Hayes"The sweetest, most generous-hearted satire of the Hollywood film industry the town has ever produced, Sullivan’s Travels was the fourth of the eight films Preston Sturges made during his astonishingly prolific streak between 1940 and 1944... It has survived its initial mixed critical reception and non-hit status to rank as one of Sturges’ most beloved films. Conceived as a self-justification for the creative path he had chosen, this film evolved into one from the heart, the single picture that moves through all the pratfalls and pranks and witticisms and barbs and in-jokes to achieve a synthesis that is both terribly funny and deeply moving." - Todd McCarthy, The Criterion CollectionSelected by Ben Stiller, Richard Linklater, Kevin Jackson, A.O. Scott, John Lasseter.

The Sun Shines Bright

1953 / USA / 90m / BW / Drama, AmericanaCharles Winninger, Arleen Whelan, John Russell, Stepin Fetchit, Russell Simpson, Jane Darwell, Grant Withers, Ludwig Stossel, Francis Ford, Paul Hurst"My favorite John Ford feature was also the director's, and it's one of his cheapest and coziest, made in black and white at Republic Pictures. Vaguely a remake of his 1934 Judge Priest, set in an idyllic Kentucky town at the turn of the century, it features the same alcoholic hero this time played by Charles Winninger and even more transparently a stand-in for Ford. The busy plot, confused by insensitive studio cutting, concerns racial strife, prostitution, prudery, and death and involves the entire community; Ford makes the film a ceremonial elegy and testament to everything that he loves and respects." - Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago ReaderSelected by Fred Camper, Shinji Aoyama, Craig Keller, Tom Milne, Jean Douchet.

Sunrise

1927 / USA / 110m / BW / Melodrama, Romantic DramaGeorge O'Brien, Janet Gaynor, Margaret Livingston, Bodil Rosing, J. Farrell MacDonald, Ralph Sipperly, Jane Winton, Arthur Housman, Eddie Boland, Barry Norton"The best foreign film ever made in the United States. German director F.W. Murnau was given a free hand by William Fox for his first Hollywood production; it's breathtaking to see the full range of American technology and American budgets in the service of a great artist's personal vision… The miracle of Murnau's mise-en-scene is to fill the simple plot and characters with complex, piercing emotions, all evoked visually through a dense style that embraces not only spectacular expressionism but a subtle and delicate naturalism. Released in 1927, the last year of silent film, it's a pinnacle of that lost art." - Dave Kehr, Chicago ReaderSelected by Luca Guadagnino, Bertrand Bonello, Aki Kaurismaki, David Denby, Andrzej Zulawski.

Sunset Blvd.

1950 / USA / 110m / BW / Showbiz Drama, SatireGloria Swanson, William Holden, Erich von Stroheim, Nancy Olson, Fred Clark, Jack Webb, Cecil B. DeMille, Buster Keaton, Hedda Hopper, Lloyd Gough"Gloria Swanson deserves to be called iconic in Billy Wilder's priceless 1950 classic. She is Norma Desmond, the forgotten silent movie queen living in shabby, mouldering opulence. It is a delicious comedy with a psycho edge, as hard-up screenwriter Joe Gillis (Holden) has car trouble and pulls off Sunset Boulevard into a strange driveway, at the top of which lies a veritable Bates motel of sociopathy and rage: Norma's creepy mansion. He is sucked into the world of a kept man, with horrifying results. This is an unmissable commentary on Hollywood's rejection of its silent past: a kind of Sobbin' in the Rain." - Peter Bradshaw, The GuardianSelected by Joe Dante, Andrei Plakhov, Andrew Dominik, Michael Caton-Jones, Nasreen Munni Kabir.See also 1,000 Noir Films.

El Sur

1983 / Spain-France / 95m / Col / DramaOmero Antonutti, Sonsoles Aranguren, Iciar Bollain, Lola Cardona, Rafaela Aparicio, Aurore Clement, Francisco Merino, Maria Caro, Jose Vivo, Germaine Montero"El sur is for me – and others – one of the greatest films ever made in Spain, and perhaps Erice’s most refined and mature work as a director… El sur does not tell a particularly extraordinary tale. But the tale it does tell is rendered in quite original and moving ways, and in tones much more subtle and deep than its literary source. This does not mean it is a contrived, sophisticated, obscure or intellectual movie, even if it avoids sentimental trappings or “easy-to-make” political readings. El sur, as it is, tells of a young woman who recalls her father’s mysterious figure and fate, trying to understand why he acted as he did." - Miguel Marías, Senses of CinemaSelected by Isao Yukisada, Carmelo Romero, Jaume Balagueró, Marcela Gamberini, Sergio F. Pinilla.

The Sweet Hereafter

1997 / Canada / 112m / Col / Drama, Ensemble FilmIan Holm, Sarah Polley, Bruce Greenwood, Tom McCamus, Arsinee Khanjian, Alberta Watson, Maury Chaykin, Gabrielle Rose, Peter Donaldson, David Hemblen"A school bus skids off an icy road and sinks into a frozen lake, taking with it the children of a tiny, once neighborly Adirondack town. Presented midway through this latest, biggest and most wrenching film by the brilliantly analytical Atom Egoyan, this image becomes the basis for a many-faceted moral inquiry… Making this material very much his own, the filmmaker creates schematic, intuitive images that hauntingly crystallize the characters' situations… For all the suffering it describes, this eloquent film also carries the exhilaration of crystal-clear artistic vision." - Janet Maslin, The New York TimesSelected by Bálint Szalóky, Amy Berg, M.K. Raghavendra, Elizabeth Banks, Tero Vainio.

Syndromes and a Century

2006 / Thailand-France-Austria-Netherlands / 105m / Col / Drama, Ensemble FilmNantarat Sawaddikul, Jaruchai Iamaram, Nu Nimsomboon, Arkanae Cherkam, Sakda Kaewbuadee, Jenjira Pongpas, Sophon Pukanok, Manasanant Porndispong, Wanna Wattanajinda, Apirak Mittrpracha"Profoundly mysterious, erotic, funny, gentle, playful, utterly distinctive… Syndromes and a Century is a poem on screen: a film of ideas and visual tropes that upends conventional narrative expectations… It's a movie to be compared with the work of Antonioni - or Sergei Parajanov… If you want a film as challenging and exhilarating as the most weird and wonderful exhibition at Tate Modern, if you are bored with all the usual boilerplate material coming out of Hollywood, or even if you're not, then this is a film for you. Try it." - Peter Bradshaw, The GuardianSelected by Yorgos Lanthimos, Jonathan Romney, May Adadol Ingawanij, Diego Lerer, Aditya Assarat.See also The 21st Century's Most Acclaimed Films.